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Many Series seasons have no episodes (until Refresh Metadata -> Scan for new and updated files) #253
Description
Describe the bug
When I navigate into the season of a Series, it has no episodes. But not for all Series, just most.
Since a small number of Series do have episodes in their seasons, I don't know if I am being impatient, although I have waited many minutes for them to show up, refreshing as I wait.
To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:
Not entirely clear beyond the obvious steps.
Expected behavior
All Series shows should have episodes in their seasons they way they do on other IPTV apps connected to the same provider and account.
Screenshots
Software stack
Plugin version: 0.8.0
Server version: 10.11.2
Tested clients:
- Web browser version: Chrome latest
- Official Android TV app version: xx.xx.x
- Official Android app version: xx.xx.x
- Other xxx version: xx.xx.x
Additional context
It's not clear to me when the data about episodes is supposed to be fetched, whether it's at guide update time or if it's done more real-time when I open a season of a Series show.
I was just about to submit this as is with everything above and just went back to do a bit more experimentation. It seems that if I choose to Refresh Metadata -> Scan for new and updated files, the empty season will start populating. Is this expected behaviour?
Activity
[-]Many Series seasons have no episodes (until _Refresh Metadata_ -> _Scan for new and updated files_)[/-][+]Many Series seasons have no episodes (until Refresh Metadata -> Scan for new and updated files)[/+]Picky65 commentedon Nov 14, 2025
Same problem here, season episodes taking ages to appear
brianjmurrell commentedon Nov 14, 2025
@Picky65 Did you try the Refresh Metadata -> Scan for new and updated files workaround I described above? Does that work for you also? Might be an interesting additional datapoint for this ticket if you can confirm.
I've done that both at the per-season level as well as the show level. In the latter case, it filled in all of the season's episodes.
Picky65 commentedon Nov 14, 2025
Yep does same here, but its painfully slow
bluntman42O commentedon Nov 18, 2025
I can confirm this. But eventually it refreshes. Also, big thanks to the plugin creator. I really appreciate this plugin. I have tried (threadfin, dispatcharr, xteve, and streammaster) on my server and this plugin alone destroys them all. So once again, THANKS!
brianjmurrell commentedon Nov 18, 2025
I have not seen this myself. But there are so many series and so many episodes, that to go through trying to audit which ones have episodes then and which ones don't is a needle in haystack. I just find that any series I do go into (that I have not been in before and done the manual Refresh Metadata -> Scan for new and updated files workaround) doesn't have episodes and I have to apply the work-around.
clive-stokes commentedon Dec 14, 2025
I'm not sure this is the plugin per se. I have the same issue with a large directory of strm files (with the correct directory structure with multiple seasons and episodes) and Jellyfin 10.11.4 still struggles to build the episode metadata.
uvagopisrinivas commentedon Jan 26, 2026
I'm still encountering this issue when using the Google Chromecast TV app or any other Jellyfin app for Android TV. However, it functions correctly when accessed through the native Android Jellyfin app or via a web browser.
brianjmurrell commentedon Jan 26, 2026
I gave up on this plug-in and wrote my own code to parse Xtreams and provide search results to Sonarr for TV series and create
.strmfiles for movies.The lack of response to bug reports about this plug-in was just one issue. Moreover the UX of this plugin was just not workable.
Having IPTV movies in top-level categories rather than buried in Jellyfin channels was much more usable.
firestaerter3 commentedon Jan 28, 2026
@brianjmurrell Is that a public repo? I'm also working on a number of PRs to achieve this for series/movies
uvagopisrinivas commentedon Jan 28, 2026
Please provide the link if your repo is public
We can fork it you don't mind
brianjmurrell commentedon Jan 28, 2026
It's not in any repo public or otherwise I'm afraid.
firestaerter3 commentedon Jan 29, 2026
Can you guys test this repo? https://rolandb5.github.io/Jellyfin.Xtream/repository.json
I think it does want you want (only iomplemented series for now, no movies yet) @uvagopisrinivas @brianjmurrell
I commited PRs upstream here...
brianjmurrell commentedon Jan 29, 2026
Pity that the commit history of that repos master is entirely different than the master here despite having forked from here. It's impossible to see the differences between the two projects and like what is new in the fork, etc.
Did you do a big huge rebase and force push or something in the fork?
In any case, I'm about done with this plugin. Beyond the bugs and lack of response, I really was just not a fan of the UX. Having different separate channels (what Jellyfin calls them) for the Xtream VoD and TV shows with categories that just opened up into a wall of thumbnails was just not very usable. Having to click into and out of every item just to see any metadata about the item was just too clumsy.
I understand that most of that is just the API that Jellyfin gives to a plugin so not entirely the fault of this plugin, but it is still a pretty bad UX.
Dropping
.strmfiles into directories (which are of course just Libraries) makes for a much more streamlined, native-looking and less clunky/separated media experience IMO.firestaerter3 commentedon Jan 30, 2026
@brianjmurrell You're right - I had to rewrite the git history because I accidentally committed some personal information (IP addresses, etc.) that I needed to scrub from the repo.
I've now rebuilt the fork with a clean history that properly branches from upstream. You can see the differences clearly now:
The fork now shows exactly what's added:
All features have been submitted as PRs to upstream. I understand if you've moved on to .strm files, but the fork is there for anyone who wants these features while waiting for upstream review. Looks like your usecase was similar as mine, think you'll like this
brianjmurrell commentedon Jan 30, 2026
@rolandb5 That's great! Thanks for all of this.
And yes, apologies if my comments came across as minimizing the efforts you have put into this. That was not my intention at all. You have done great work here for those that this plugin works for.
Maybe one day the JF core will be updated to allow plugins like this to have a more natural presentation of their content rather than it feeling like it's a separate space that one has to navigate to find the content.
firestaerter3 commentedon Jan 30, 2026
They didn't! Let me know, if you have ideas for other improvements. I'm using this to up my vibe coding skills...
firestaerter3 commentedon Feb 1, 2026
@brianjmurrell You inspired me with your remark to go into a different approach; based on creating a library with the stream files..
https://github.com/firestaerter3/Jellyfin-Xtream-Library
@uvagopisrinivas You were interested too in this idea.
clive-stokes commentedon Feb 2, 2026
My recommendation if you go the .strm route, is to also create .nfo files with as much information as you can from you IPTV provider. Then turn off all the image and metadata scrapers in your Jellyfin library and do a scan. Jellyfin will then use the .nfo file as the source of truth.
The difference is minutes/hours to scan a big library vs days.
firestaerter3 commentedon Feb 2, 2026
@clive-stokes Already a feature in latest version :-)
achevalet commentedon Sep 28, 2026
The cause is in Jellyfin itself: jellyfin/jellyfin#18229 (a channel folder listed by overlapping requests could come back empty) and jellyfin/jellyfin#18230 (a season's episodes were hidden until their background metadata refresh had run). Fixes: jellyfin/jellyfin#18231 and jellyfin/jellyfin#18232. With both, seasons and episodes show on first browse.